The Astronomy and Astrophysics Decadal Survey is a review of astronomy and astrophysics literature produced approximately every ten years by the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences
in the United States. The report surveys the current state of the
field, identifies research priorities, and makes recommendations for the
coming decade. The decadal survey
represents the recommendations of the research community to
governmental agencies on how to prioritize scientific funding within
astronomy and astrophysics. The editing committee is informed by topical
panels and subcommittees, dedicated conferences, and direct community input in the form of white papers summarizing the state of the art in each subdiscipline. The most recent report, Astro2020, was released in 2021.
Ground-Based Astronomy: A Ten-Year Program, 1964
The first report, Ground-Based Astronomy: A Ten-Year Program, was released in 1964. The authoring committee was chaired by Albert Whitford.
The report recommends construction of national observing facilities,
including especially mid-sized ground-based optical telescopes.
Astronomy and Astrophysics for the 1970s, 1972
The second report, Astronomy and Astrophysics for the 1970s, was released in 1972. The committee was chaired by Jesse L. Greenstein. It recommends priorities for both space- and ground-based programs, and was instrumental in the eventual construction of the Very Large Array.
Astronomy and Astrophysics for the 1980s, 1982
The third report, Astronomy and Astrophysics for the 1980s, was released in 1982. The committee was chaired by George B. Field. It recommended the launch of the "Advanced X-Ray Astrophysics Facility", which was realized in 1999 as the Chandra X-ray Observatory. It also identified construction of the Very Long Baseline Array as a priority, in addition to briefly mentioning the Hubble Space Telescope (before it received that name) and the Shuttle Infrared Telescope Facility (later Spitzer).
The Decade of Discovery in Astronomy and Astrophysics, 1991
The fourth report, The Decade of Discovery in Astronomy and Astrophysics, was released in 1991. The committee was chaired by John N. Bahcall. It recommended the launch of the "Space Infrared Telescope Facility", realized in 2003 as the Spitzer Space Telescope, the fourth and final in NASA's Great Observatories program.
Astronomy and Astrophysics in the New Millennium, 2001
The fifth report, Astronomy and Astrophysics in the New Millennium, was released in 2001. The committee was co-chaired by Christopher McKee and Joseph H. Taylor. It gives highest priority to the construction and launch of Next Generation Space Telescope, now known as the James Webb Space Telescope which launched on 25 December 2021. The report reaffirms the 1991 recommendation for the completion of the Millimeter Array, now part of the Atacama Large Millimeter Array
international collaboration. It also examines the benefits of a robust
astronomy research program to the nation, and expresses concern
regarding the percentage of funding tied to a few large projects.
New Worlds, New Horizons in Astronomy and Astrophysics, 2010
The sixth report, New Worlds, New Horizons in Astronomy and Astrophysics, was released in 2010. The committee was chaired by Roger D. Blandford. Recommendations for scientific questions to be answered include: the nature of dark energy; the structure, distribution, and evolution of exoplanetary systems; detailed examination of extreme processes including supernovae and the merger of superdense objects; and how galaxies and galaxy clusters formed from the early hot universe.
The report also examines technical readiness, scheduling, and funding
issues as well as basic science. The recommendations consider a range of
funding scenarios based on projected budgets for the major funding
agencies, NASA, the National Science Foundation, and the Department of Energy. The top priorities identified by the report include:
Pathways to Discovery in Astronomy and Astrophysics for the 2020s
The
seventh report, released to the public at 11 am ET on Thursday,
November 4, 2021, recommended scientific priorities and investments for
the next decade to help achieve the following primary goals: search for habitable exoplanets and extraterrestrial life, study black holes and neutron stars and study the growth and evolution of galaxies. The top priority recommended to the NSF was to combine the Thirty Meter Telescope and Giant Magellan Telescope
programs into one United States Extremely Large Telescope program. The
top priority recommended to NASA was to establish a new Great
Observatories Mission and Technology Maturation program that would
conduct studies into 2030s-launched telescopes, with a hybrid of LUVOIR (successor to Hubble) and HabEx (successor to Spitzer) as the first major project with an estimated cost of US$11 billion, to be followed by cheaper far-infrared astronomy and X-ray astronomy designs (the Origins Space Telescope and Lynx X-ray Observatory) with an estimated cost from US$3 billion to US$5 billion each.
Association of American Geologists and Naturalists
Washington, D.C., office of the AAAS.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated mission of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsibility, and supporting scientific education and science outreach for the betterment of all humanity.
AAAS was the first permanent organization established to promote
science and engineering nationally and to represent the interests of
American researchers from across all scientific fields. It is the world's largest general scientific society, with over 120,000 members, and is the publisher of the well-known scientific journal Science.
History
Creation
The American Association for the Advancement of Science was created on September 20, 1848, at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
It was a reformation of the Association of American Geologists and
Naturalists with the broadened mission to be the first permanent
organization to promote science and engineering nationally and to
represent the interests of American researchers from across all
scientific fields The Society chose William Charles Redfield as their first president because he had proposed the most comprehensive plans for the organization. According to the first constitution
which was agreed to at the September 20 meeting, the goal of the
society was to promote scientific dialogue in order to allow for greater
scientific collaboration.
By doing so the association aimed to use resources to conduct science
with increased efficiency and allow for scientific progress at a greater
rate.
The association also sought to increase the resources available to the
scientific community through active advocacy of science. There were
only 78 members when the AAAS was formed. As a member of the new scientific body, Matthew Fontaine Maury, USN was one of those who attended the first 1848 meeting.
At a meeting held on Friday afternoon, September 22, 1848,
Redfield presided, and Matthew Fontaine Maury gave a full scientific
report on his Wind and Current Charts. Maury stated that hundreds of ship navigators were now sending abstract logs of their voyages to the United States Naval Observatory. He added, "Never before was such a corps of observers known."
But, he pointed out to his fellow scientists, his critical need was for
more "simultaneous observations." "The work," Maury stated, "is not
exclusively for the benefit of any nation or age." The minutes of the
AAAS meeting reveal that because of the universality of this "view on
the subject, it was suggested whether the states of Christendom might
not be induced to cooperate with their Navies in the undertaking; at
least so far as to cause abstracts of their log-books and sea journals
to be furnished to Matthew F. Maury, USN, at the Naval Observatory at Washington."
William Barton Rogers, professor at the University of Virginia and later founder of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, offered a resolution: "Resolved that a Committee of five be appointed to address a memorial to the Secretary of the Navy, requesting his further aid in procuring for Matthew Maury the use of the observations of European
and other foreign navigators, for the extension and perfecting of his
charts of winds and currents." The resolution was adopted and, in
addition to Rogers, the following members of the association were
appointed to the committee: Professor Joseph Henry
of Washington; Professor Benjamin Peirce of Cambridge, Massachusetts;
Professor James H. Coffin of Easton, Pennsylvania, and Professor Stephen
Alexander of Princeton, New Jersey. This was scientific cooperation, and Maury went back to Washington with great hopes for the future.
By 1860, membership increased to over 2,000. The AAAS became dormant during the American Civil War; their August 1861 meeting in Nashville, Tennessee, was postponed indefinitely after the outbreak of the first major engagement of the war at Bull Run. The AAAS did not become a permanent casualty of the war.
In 1866, Frederick Barnard presided over the first meeting of the resurrected AAAS at a meeting in New York City.
Following the revival of the AAAS, the group had considerable growth.
The AAAS permitted all people, regardless of scientific credentials, to
join. The AAAS did, however, institute a policy of granting the title of
"Fellow of the AAAS"
to well-respected scientists within the organization. The years of
peace brought the development and expansion of other scientific-oriented
groups. The AAAS's focus on the unification of many fields of science
under a single organization was in contrast to the many new science
organizations founded to promote a single discipline. For example, the American Chemical Society, founded in 1876, promotes chemistry.
In 1863, the US Congress established the National Academy of Sciences,
another multidisciplinary sciences organization. It elects members
based on recommendations from colleagues and the value of published
works.
Twentieth century
Advocacy
Alan I. Leshner,
AAAS CEO from 2001 until 2015, published many op-ed articles discussing
how many people integrate science and religion in their lives. He has
opposed the insertion of non-scientific content, such as creationism or intelligent design, into the scientific curriculum of schools.
In December 2006, the AAAS adopted an official statement on climate change,
in which they stated, "The scientific evidence is clear: global climate
change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing
threat to society....The pace of change and the evidence of harm have
increased markedly over the last five years. The time to control greenhouse gas emissions is now."
In February 2007, the AAAS used satellite images to document human rights abuses in Burma.
The next year, AAAS launched the Center for Science Diplomacy to
advance both science and the broader relationships among partner
countries, by promoting science diplomacy and international scientific cooperation.
In 2012, AAAS published op-eds, held events on Capitol Hill
and released analyses of the U.S. federal research-and-development
budget, to warn that a budget sequestration would have severe
consequences for scientific progress.
Sciences
AAAS covers various areas of sciences and engineering. It has 24 sections, each with a committee and its chair. These committees are also entrusted with the annual evaluation and selection of Fellows. The sections are:
The most recent Constitution of the AAAS, enacted on January 1, 1973,
establishes that the governance of the AAAS is accomplished through
four entities: a President, a group of administrative officers, a
Council, and a board of directors.
Individuals elected to the presidency of the AAAS hold a three-year term in a unique way. The first year is spent as president-elect, the second as president and the third as chairperson of the board of directors. In accordance with the convention followed by the AAAS, presidents are referenced by the year in which they left office.
Geraldine Richmond is the president of AAAS for 2015–16; Phillip Sharp is the board chair; and Barbara A. Schaal is the president-elect. Each took office on the last day of the 2015 AAAS Annual Meeting in February 2015. On the last day of the 2016 AAAS Annual Meeting, February 15, 2016, Richmond will become the chair, Schaal will become the president, and a new president-elect will take office.
Past presidents of AAAS have included some of the most important
scientific figures of their time. Among them: explorer and geologist John Wesley Powell (1888); astronomer and physicist Edward Charles Pickering (1912); anthropologist Margaret Mead (1975); and biologist Stephen Jay Gould (2000).
There
are three classifications of high-level administrative officials that
execute the basic, daily functions of the AAAS. These are the executive officer, the treasurer and then each of the AAAS's section secretaries. The current CEO of AAAS and executive publisher of Science magazine is Sudip Parikh. The current Editor in Chief of Science magazine is Holden Thorp.
The council is composed of the members of the Board of Directors, the
retiring section chairmen, elected delegates and affiliated foreign
council members. Among the elected delegates there are always at least
two members from the National Academy of Sciences and one from each
region of the country. The President of the AAAS serves as the
Chairperson of the council. Members serve the council for a term of
three years.
The council meets annually to discuss matters of importance to
the AAAS. They have the power to review all activities of the
Association, elect new fellows, adopt resolutions, propose amendments to
the Association's constitution and bylaws, create new scientific
sections, and organize and aid local chapters of the AAAS. The Council
recently
has new additions to it from different sections which include many
youngsters as well. John Kerry of Chicago is the youngest American in
the council and Akhil Ennamsetty of India is the youngest foreign
council member.
Board of directors
The
board of directors is composed of a chairperson, the president, and the
president-elect along with eight elected directors, the executive
officer of the association and up to two additional directors appointed
by elected officers. Members serve a four-year term except for directors
appointed by elected officers, who serve three-year terms.
The current chairman is Gerald Fink,
Margaret and Herman Sokol Professor at Whitehead Institute, MIT. Fink
will serve in the post until the end of the 2016 AAAS Annual Meeting, 15 February 2016. (The chairperson is always the immediate past-president of AAAS.)
The board of directors has a variety of powers and
responsibilities. It is charged with the administration of all
association funds, publication of a budget, appointment of
administrators, proposition of amendments, and determining the time and
place of meetings of the national association. The board may also speak
publicly on behalf of the association. The board must also regularly
correspond with the council to discuss their actions.
The AAAS council elects every year, its members who are distinguished scientifically, to the grade of fellow (FAAAS).
Election to AAAS is an honor bestowed by their peers and elected
fellows are presented with a certificate and rosette pin. To limit the
effects and tolerance of sexual harassment in the sciences, starting 15
October 2018, a Fellow's status can be revoked "in cases of proven
scientific misconduct, serious breaches of professional ethics, or when
the Fellow in the view of the AAAS otherwise no longer merits the status
of Fellow."
Meetings
Formal
meetings of the AAAS are numbered consecutively, starting with the
first meeting in 1848. Meetings were not held 1861–1865 during the
American Civil War, and also 1942–1943 during World War II. Since 1946, one meeting has occurred annually, now customarily in February.
Awards and fellowships
Each year, the AAAS gives out a number of honorary awards, most of which focus on science communication,
journalism, and outreach – sometimes in partnership with other
organizations. The awards recognize "scientists, journalists, and public
servants for significant contributions to science and to the public's
understanding of science". The awards are presented each year at the association's annual meeting.
SciLine is a philanthropically funded and editorially independent service for journalists and scientists. Its launch was announced in an October 27, 2017 article in Science by founding director Rick Weiss, former communications chief at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and science reporter at the Washington Post.
Its stated mission is to increase the amount and quality of
research-backed evidence in news stories by connecting U.S. journalists
to scientists and to validated scientific information.
Reporters in the United States can access SciLine's services,
which include expert-matching, general media briefings, expert quote
sheets, and quick fact sheets. As of July 2021, SciLine had fulfilled
approximately 2,000 requests from 650 journalists through its
expert-matching service.
In 1996, AAAS launched the EurekAlert! website, an editorially independent, non-profit news release distribution service covering all areas of science, medicine and technology. EurekAlert! provides news in English, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Japanese, and, from 2007, in Chinese.
Working staff journalists and freelancers who meet eligibility
guidelines can access the latest studies before publication and obtain
embargoed information in compliance with the U.S. Securities and
Exchange Commission's Regulation Fair Disclosure policy.
By early 2018, more than 14,000 reporters from more than 90 countries
have registered for free access to embargoed materials. More than 5,000
active public information officers from 2,300 universities, academic
journals, government agencies, and medical centers are credentialed to
provide new releases to reporters and the public through the system.
In 1998, European science organizations countered Eurekalert! with a press release distribution service AlphaGalileo.
EurekAlert! has fallen under criticism for lack of press release standards and for generating churnalism.
NSF's director and deputy director are appointed by the president of the United States and confirmed by the United States Senate, whereas the 24 president-appointed members of the National Science Board (NSB)
do not require U.S. Senate confirmation. The director and deputy
director are responsible for administration, planning, budgeting and
day-to-day operations of the foundation, while the NSB meets six times a
year to establish its overall policies. The current NSF director is Sethuraman Panchanathan.
History
Founding
The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) was established by the National Science Foundation Act of 1950.
Its stated mission is "to promote the progress of science, to advance
the national health, prosperity, and welfare, and to secure the national
defense."
The NSF's scope has expanded over the years to include many areas that
were not in its initial portfolio, including the social and behavioral
sciences, engineering, and science and mathematics education. The NSF is
the only U.S. federal agency with a mandate to support all non-medical fields of research.
Budget and performance history
Since the technology boom of the 1980s, the U.S. Congress has generally embraced the premise that government-funded basic research
is essential for the nation's economic health and global
competitiveness, and for national defense. This support has manifested
in an expanding National Science Foundation budget from $1 billion in
1983 to $8.28 billion in 2020.
NSF has published annual reports since 1950, which since the new
millennium have been two reports, variously called "Performance Report"
and "Accountability Report" or "Performance Highlights" and "Financial
Highlights"; the latest available FY 2013 Agency Financial Report was
posted December 16, 2013, and the six-page FY 2013 Performance and
Financial Highlights was posted March 25, 2013. More recently, the NSF has focused on obtaining high return on investment from their spending on scientific research.
Various bills have sought to direct funds within the NSF. In 1981, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) introduced a proposal to reduce the NSF social sciences directorate's budget by 75%. Economist Robert A. Moffit suggests a connection between this proposal and Democratic Senator William Proxmire'sGolden Fleece Award
series criticizing "frivolous" government spending — Proxmire's first
Golden Fleece had been awarded to the NSF in 1975 for granting $84,000
to a social science project investigating why people fall in love.
Ultimately, the OMB's 75% reduction proposal failed, but the NSF
Economics Program budget did fall 40%. In 2012, political science research was barred from NSF funding by the passage of the Flake Amendment, breaking the precedent of granting the NSF autonomy to determine its own priorities.
Funding Profile
In
Fiscal Year 2020, NSF received 42,400 proposals and awarded 12,100, for
a funding rate of 28%. In FY 2021, the estimates are 43,200 and 11,500
respectively, giving a funding rate of 26.6%. According to FY 2020
numbers, the median annualized award size is $153,800 and the average
duration of an award is 2.9 years.
In 2022 the NSF has started funding Open Source Software as part of their Pathways to Enable Open-Source Ecosystems (POSE) program.
Timeline
Pre–World War II
Although
the federal government had established nearly 40 scientific
organizations between 1910 and 1940, the US relied upon a primarily laissez-faire
approach to scientific research and development. Academic research in
science and engineering occasionally received federal funding. Within
University laboratories, almost all support came from private
contributions and charitable foundations. In industrial laboratories,
the concentration of workers and funding (some through military and
government programs as a result of Roosevelt's New Deal)
would eventually raise concern during the wartime period. In
particular, concerns were raised that industry laboratories were largely
allowed full patent rights of technologies developed with federal
funds. These concerns, in part, led to efforts like Senator Harley M. Kilgore's "Science Mobilization Act".
1940–49
Amidst
growing awareness that US military capability depended on strength in
science and engineering, Congress considered several proposals to
support research in these fields. Separately, President Franklin D. Roosevelt sponsored creation of organizations to coordinate federal funding of science for war, including the National Defense Research Committee and the Office of Scientific Research and Development
(OSRD) both from 1941 to 1947. Despite broad agreement over the
principle of federal support for science, working out a consensus on how
to organize and manage it required five years.
The five-year political debate over the creation of a national
scientific agency has been a topic for academic study, understood from a
variety of perspectives. Themes include disagreements over administrative structure, patents and inclusion of social sciences, a populist-versus-scientist dispute, as well as the roles of political parties, Congress, and President Truman.
Commonly, this debate is characterized by the conflict between New Deal Senator Harley M. Kilgore and OSRD head Vannevar Bush.
Narratives about the National Science Foundation prior to the 1970s
typically concentrated on Vannevar Bush and his 1945 publication
Science—The Endless Frontier. In this report, Vannevar Bush, then head of the Office of Scientific Research and Development which began the Manhattan Project, addressed plans for the postwar years to further foster government commitment to science and technology.
Issued to President Harry S. Truman in July 1945, the report made a
strong case for federally-funded scientific research, arguing that the
nation would reap rich dividends in the form of better health care, a
more vigorous economy, and a stronger national defense. It proposed
creating a new federal agency, the National Research Foundation.
The NSF first appeared as a comprehensive New Deal Policy proposed by Sen. Harley Kilgore of West Virginia. In 1942, Senator Kilgore introduced the "Science Mobilization Act" (S. 1297), which did not pass.
Perceiving organizational chaos, elitism, over-concentration of funds
in elite universities, and lack of incentives for socially applicable
research, Kilgore envisioned a comprehensive and centralized research
body supporting basic and applied research which would be controlled by members of the public and civil servants rather than scientific experts.
The public would own the rights to all patents funded by public monies
and research monies would be equitably spread across universities.
Kilgore's supporters included non-elite universities, small businesses,
and the Budget Bureau. His proposals received mixed support.
Vannevar Bush opposed Kilgore, preferring science policy driven by experts and scientists rather than public and civil servants.
Bush was concerned that public interests would politicize science, and
believed that scientists would be the best judges of the direction and
needs of their field. While Bush and Kilgore both agreed on the need for
a national science policy, Bush maintained that scientists should continue to own the research results and patents,
wanted project selection limited to scientists, and focused support on
basic research, not the social sciences, leaving the market to support
applied projects.
Sociologist Daniel Kleinman divides the debate into three broad
legislative attempts. The first attempt consisted of the 1945 Magnuson
bill (S. 1285), the 1945 Science and Technology Mobilization Bill, a
1945 compromise bill (S. 1720), a 1946 compromise bill (S. 1850), and
the Mills Bill (H.B. 6448). The Magnuson bill was sponsored by Senator Warren Magnuson
and drafted by the OSRD, headed by Vannevar Bush. The Science and
Technology Mobilization bill was promoted by Harley Kilgore. The bills
called for the creation of a centralized science agency, but differed in
governance and research supported. The second attempt, in 1947, included Senator H. Alexander Smith's bill S. 526, and Senator Elbert Thomas's
bill S. 525. The Smith bill reflected ideas of Vannevar Bush, while the
Thomas bill was identical to the previous year's compromise bill (S.
1850).
After amendments, the Smith bill made it to President Truman's
desk, but it was vetoed. Truman wrote that regrettably, the proposed
agency would have been "divorced from control by the people to an extent
that implies a distinct lack of faith in the democratic process".
The third attempt began with the introduction of S. 2385 in 1948. This
was a compromise bill cosponsored by Smith and Kilgore, and Bush aide
John Teeter had contributed in the drafting process. In 1949, S. 247 was
introduced by the same group of senators behind S. 2385, marking the
fourth and final effort to establish a national science agency.
Essentially identical to S. 2385, S. 247 passed the Senate and the House
with a few amendments.
It was signed by President Truman on May 10, 1950. Kleinman points out
that the final NSF bill closely resembles Vannevar Bush's proposals.
With the Korean War underway, the agency's initial budget was
just $151,000 for 9 months. After moving its administrative offices
twice, NSF began its first full year of operations with an appropriation
from Congress of $3.5 million, far less the almost $33.5 million
requested with which 28 research grants were awarded.
After the 1957 Soviet Union orbited Sputnik 1,
the first ever human-made satellite, national self-appraisal questioned
American education, scientific, technical and industrial strength and
Congress increased the NSF appropriation for 1958 to $40 million.
In 1958 the NSF selected Kitt Peak, near Tucson, Arizona,
as the site of the first national observatory, that would give any
astronomer unprecedented access to state-of-the-art telescopes;
previously major research telescopes were privately funded, available
only to astronomers who taught at the universities that ran them. The
idea expanded to encompass the National Optical Astronomy Observatory, the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, the National Solar Observatory, the Gemini Observatory and the Arecibo Observatory, all of which are funded in whole or in part by NSF. The NSF's astronomy program forged a close working relationship with NASA,
also founded in 1958, in that the NSF provides virtually all the U.S.
federal support for ground-based astronomy, while NASA's responsibility
is the U.S. effort in space-based astronomy.
In 1959 the U.S. and other nations concluded the Antarctic Treaty reserving Antarctica
for peaceful and scientific research, and a presidential directive gave
the NSF responsibility for virtually all U.S. Antarctic operations and
research in form of the United States Antarctic Program.
1960–69
In 1963, President John F. Kennedy appointed Leland John Haworth as the second director of the NSF. During the 1960s, the impact of the Sputnik Crisis spurred international competition in science and technology and accelerated NSF growth.
The NSF initiated a number of programs that support institution-wide
research during this decade including the Graduate Science Facilities
program (started in 1960), Institutional Grants for Science (started in
1961), and Science Development Grants, better known as Centers of
Excellence program (started in 1964). Notable projects conducted during this decade include creation of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (1960), creation of the Division of Environmental Sciences (1965), deep sea exploration endeavors Project Mohole (1961) and the Deep Sea Drilling Project (1968–1983), the Ecosystems Analysis Program (1969), and ownership of the Arecibo Observatory (1969). In 1969, Franklin Long was tentatively selected to take over directorship of the NSF. His nomination caused some controversy due to his opposition to the current administration's antiballistic missile program and was ultimately rejected by President Richard Nixon.William D. McElroy instead took over as the third director of the NSF in 1969. By 1968, the NSF budget had reached nearly $500 million.
1970–79
In 1972 the NSF took over management of twelve interdisciplinary materials research laboratories from the Defense Department's Advanced Research Projects Agency
(DARPA). These university-based laboratories had taken a more
integrated approach than did most academic departments at the time,
encouraging physicists, chemists, engineers, and metallurgists to cross
departmental boundaries and use systems approaches to attack complex
problems of materials synthesis or processing. The NSF expanded these
laboratories into a nationwide network of Materials Research Science and Engineering Centers. In 1972 the NSF launched the biennial "Science & Engineering Indicators" report
to the US president and Congress, as required by the NSF Act of 1950.
In 1977 the first interconnection of unrelated networks was developed,
run by DARPA.
1980–89
During
this decade, increasing NSF involvement lead to a three-tiered system
of internetworks managed by a mix of universities, nonprofit
organizations, and government agencies. By the mid-1980s, primary
financial support for the growing project was assumed by the NSF.
In 1983, NSF budget topped $1 billion for the first time. Major
increases in the nation's research budget were proposed as "the country
recognizes the importance of research in science and technology, and
education". The U.S. Antarctic Program
was taken out of the NSF appropriation now requiring a separate
appropriation. The NSF received more than 27,000 proposals and funded
more than 12,000 of them in 1983. In 1985, the NSF delivered ozone
sensors, along with balloons and helium, to researchers at the South
Pole so they can measure stratospheric ozone loss. This was in response
to findings earlier that year, indicating a steep drop in ozone over a
period of several years. The Internet project continued, now known as NSFNET.
1990–99
In
1990 the NSF's appropriation passed $2 billion for the first time. NSF
funded the development of several curricula based on the NCTM standards, devised by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. These standards were widely adopted by school districts during the subsequent decade. However, in what newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal called the "math wars", organizations such as Mathematically Correct complained that some elementary texts based on the standards, including Mathland,
had almost entirely abandoned any instruction of traditional arithmetic
in favor of cutting, coloring, pasting, and writing. During that
debate, NSF was both lauded and criticized for favoring the standards.
In 1991 the NSFNET acceptable use policy
was altered to allow commercial traffic. By 1995, with private,
commercial market thriving, NSF decommissioned the NSFNET, allowing for
public use of the Internet. In 1993 students and staff at the
NSF-supported National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, developed Mosaic, the first freely available browser to allow World Wide Web
pages that include both graphics and text. Within 18 months, NCSA
Mosaic becomes the Web browser of choice for more than a million users,
and sets off an exponential growth in the number of Web users. In 1994
NSF, together with DARPA and NASA, launched the Digital Library Initiative. One of the first six grants went to Stanford University, where two graduate students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin,
began to develop a search engine that used the links between Web pages
as a ranking method, which they later commercialized under the name Google.
In 1996 NSF-funded research established beyond doubt that the
chemistry of the atmosphere above Antarctica was grossly abnormal and
that levels of key chlorine compounds are greatly elevated. During two
months of intense work, NSF researchers learned most of what is known
about the ozone hole.
In 1998 two independent teams of NSF-supported astronomers
discovered that the expansion of the universe was actually speeding up,
as if some previously unknown force, now known as dark energy, is driving the galaxies apart at an ever-increasing rate.
Since passage of the Small Business Technology Transfer Act of
1992 (Public Law 102–564, Title II), NSF has been required to reserve
0.3% of its extramural research budget for Small Business Technology
Transfer awards, and 2.8% of its R&D budget for small business
innovation research.
2000–09
NSF joined with other federal agencies in the National Nanotechnology Initiative,
dedicated to the understanding and control of matter at the atomic and
molecular scale. NSF's roughly $300 million annual investment in
nanotechnology research was still one of the largest in the 23-agency
initiative. In 2001, NSF's appropriation passed $4 billion. The NSF's
"Survey of Public Attitudes Toward and Understanding of Science and
Technology" revealed that the public had a positive attitude toward
science, but a poor understanding of it. During 2004–5 NSF sent "rapid response" research teams to investigate the aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster and Hurricane Katrina. An NSF-funded engineering team helped uncover why the levees failed in New Orleans.
In 2005, NSF's budget stood at $5.6 billion, in 2006 it stood at
$5.91 billion for the 2007 fiscal year (October 1, 2006, through
September 30, 2007), and in 2007 NSF requested $6.43 billion for FY
2008.
2010–19
President Obama requested $7.373 billion for fiscal year 2013. Due to the October 1, 2013 shutdown
of the Federal Government, and NSF's lapse in funding, their website
was down "until further notice", but was brought back online after the
US government passed their budget. In 2014, NSF awarded rapid response
grants to study a chemical spill that contaminated the drinking water of
about 300,000 West Virginia residents. In early 2018, it was announced that Trump would cut NSF Research Funding by 30% but quickly rescinded this due to backlash.
As of May 2018, Heather Wilson, the secretary of the Air Force, signed
that letter of intent with the director of NSF initiating partnership
for the research related to space operations and Geosciences, advanced material sciences, information and data sciences, and workforce and processes.
Grants and the merit review process
A grant proposal which the National Science Foundation chose to fund
The NSF seeks to fulfill its mission chiefly by issuing competitive,
limited-term grants in response to specific proposals from the research
community and establishing cooperative agreements with research
organizations. It does not operate its own laboratories, unlike other federal research agencies, notable examples being NASA and the National Institutes of Health
(NIH). The NSF uses four main mechanisms to communicate funding
opportunities and generate proposals: dear colleague letters, program
descriptions, program announcements, and program solicitations.
The NSF receives over 50,000 such proposals each year, and funds about 10,000 of them.
Those funded are typically projects that are ranked highest in a
'merit review' process, the current version of which was introduced in
1997.
Reviews are carried out by ad hoc reviewers and panels of independent
scientists, engineers, and educators who are experts in the relevant
fields of study, and who are selected by the NSF with particular
attention to avoiding conflicts of interest. For example, reviewers
cannot work at the NSF itself, nor for the institution that employs the
proposing researchers. All proposal evaluations are confidential: the
proposing researchers may see them, but they do not see the names of the
reviewers.
The first merit review criterion is 'intellectual merit', the
second is that of the 'broader societal impact' of the proposed
research; the latter reflects a broader global trend for funding
agencies to demand evidence of research 'impact' and has been met with
opposition from the scientific and policy communities since its
inception in 1997. In June 2010, the National Science Board
(NSB), the governing body for NSF and science advisers to both the
legislative and executive branches, convened a 'Task Force on Merit
Review' to determine "how well the current Merit Review criteria used by
the NSF to evaluate all proposals were serving the agency."
The task force reinforced its support for both criteria as appropriate
for the goals and aims of the agency and published a revised version of
the merit review criteria in its 2012 report, to clarify and improve the
function of the criteria. However, both criteria already had been
mandated for all NSF merit review procedures in the 2010
re-authorization of the America COMPETES Act. The Act also includes an emphasis on promoting potentially transformative research, a phrase which has been included in the most recent incarnation of the 'merit review' criteria.
Most NSF grants go to individuals or small groups of
investigators, who carry out research at their home campuses. Other
grants provide funding for mid-scale research centers, instruments, and
facilities that serve researchers from many institutions. Still, others
fund national-scale facilities that are shared by the research community
as a whole. Examples of national facilities include the NSF's national
observatories, with their giant optical and radio telescopes; its Antarctic
research sites; its high-end computer facilities and ultra-high-speed
network connections; the ships and submersibles used for ocean research;
and its gravitational wave observatories.
In addition to researchers and research facilities, NSF grants
also support science, engineering and mathematics education from pre-K
through graduate school. Undergraduates can receive funding through Research Experiences for Undergraduates summer programs. Graduate students are supported through Integrative Graduate Education Research Traineeships (IGERT) and Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP) programs and through the Graduate Research Fellowships, NSF-GRF. K–12 and some community college instructors are eligible to participate in compensated Research Experiences for Teachers programs.
In addition, an early career-development program (CAREER) supports
teacher-scholars that most effectively integrate research and education
within the mission of their organization, as a foundation for a lifetime
of integrated contributions.
The NSF is broadly organized into four offices, seven directorates, and the National Science Board. It employs about 2,100 people in permanent, temporary and contractual positions at its headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia. Prior to 2017, its headquarters were located in Arlington, Virginia.
In addition to around 1,400 permanent employees and the staffs of the NSB office and the Office of the Inspector General, NSF's workforce includes some 200 scientists on temporary duty and 450 contract workers.
Scientists from research institutions can join the NSF as temporary
program directors, called "rotators", overseeing the merit review
process and searching for new funding opportunities. These assignments
typically last 1–2 years, but may extend to 4. The NSF also offers contracting opportunities. As of May 2018, the NSF has 53 existing contracts.
Offices
Office of the Director
Office of the Inspector General
Office of Budget, Finance, and Award Management
Office of Information & Resource Management
Office of the Chief Information Officer
The NSF also supports research through several offices within the
Office of the Director, including the Office of Integrative Activities, and Office of International Science and Engineering.
Research directorates
The NSF organizes its research and education support through eight directorates, each encompassing several disciplines:
Computer and Information Science and Engineering (theoretical computer science, fundamental hardware and software, systems and networking, and artificial intelligence)
Engineering (bioengineering, environmental systems, civil and
mechanical systems, chemical and transport systems, electrical and
communications systems, and design and manufacturing)
Geosciences (geological, atmospheric and ocean sciences)
An eighth directorate, the Directorate for Technology, Innovation and
Partnerships (TIP), was created in 2022 to accelerate the transition of
basic research into real world impact.
It has a primary goal of the support of use-inspired research and the
translation of research results to the market and society.
Overseas sites
Prior
to October 2018, NSF maintained three overseas offices to promote
collaboration between the science and engineering communities of the
United States and other continents' scientific communities:
Brussels for Europe, formerly based in Paris (established 1984; relocated to Brussels in 2015)
Tokyo for East Asia, except China (established 1960)
All three overseas offices were shut down in October 2018, to reflect
the agency's move to a more nimble international posture. Rather than
maintain dedicated offices, NSF will dispatch small teams to specific
international institutions. Teams may work for up to a week on-site to
evaluate research and explore collaborations with the institution.
Crosscutting programs
In
addition to the research it funds in specific disciplines, the NSF has
launched a number of projects that coordinate the efforts of experts in
many disciplines, which often involve collaborations with other U.S.
federal agencies. Examples include initiatives in:
National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics
NSF's National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics
(NCSES) gathers data from surveys and partnerships with other agencies
to offer official data on the American science and engineering
workforce, graduates of advanced U.S. science and engineering programs,
and R&D expenditures by U.S. industry. NCSES is one of the principal U.S. statistical agencies. It is a part of the NSF's Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences Directorate (SBE).
Criticism
In May 2011, Republican Senator Tom Coburn released a 73-page report, "National Science Foundation: Under the Microscope", receiving immediate attention from such media outlets as The New York Times, Fox News, and MSNBC.
The report found fault with various research projects and was critical
of the social sciences. It started a controversy about political bias
and a Congressional Inquiry into federally sponsored research. In 2014,
Republicans proposed a bill to limit the NSF Board's authority in
grant-writing.
In 2013, the NSF had funded the work of Mark Carey at University of Oregon
with a $412,930 grant, which included a study concerning gender in
glaciological research. After its January 2016 release, the NSF drew
criticism for alleged misuse of funding.
Some historians of science have argued that the National Science
Foundation Act of 1950 was an unsatisfactory compromise between too many
clashing visions of the purpose and scope of the federal government. The NSF was certainly not the primary government agency for the funding of basic science, as its supporters had originally envisioned in the aftermath of World War II. By 1950, support for major areas of research had already become dominated by specialized agencies such as the National Institutes of Health (medical research) and the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (nuclear and particle physics). That pattern would continue after 1957 when U.S. anxiety over the launch of Sputnik led to the creation of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (space science) and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (defense-related research).
